Chapter Text
"Baby girl, you're sat on my foot."
"Oops."
"Ow! Eliza, you're on me now!"
"Oops."
"Where's the goddamn light?"
The boys paused and listened to the soft voices of girls coming from the place where they were supposed to be used as a headquarters for the Dead Poets Society. Clearly, others had gotten to it first and those others were clearly from Weltons Academy For Girls- a school located a mile or two away from the boy's academy. This place was located somewhere in the middle, no one could precisely say where as no one had been there during the day.
Neil was the first to make a move, the one who had ultimately convinced the others to go in the first place, and stood by the entrance and called down- "Hello?"
There was an instant silence followed by whispers before a hesitant feminine voice greeted: "Hi..."
Neil crouched down, "We were coming to hang out here, uhh, is it okay if we come in too?"
Another voice answered, "...how many of you, are there?"
"Six."
"...Okay."
"We can come in?"
"Only if you answer this!" Another voice spoke up before Neil could take a step further.
"Uhh, sure, what?"
"Have you come to these woods to live deliberately?" The familiar words stunned the gathering of boys, they held their flashlights to their confused faces. Neil looked down at his copy of the Leaves Of Grass with a mystified expression.
Todd was the one to answer, "Yes... and to see if I could not learn what it had to teach."
"Okay, enter."
The young men thumped Todd on the back and ruffled his hair as they made their way inside with excited grins. Inside they found a scarcely furnished room, what little furniture there was it was old and cracked yet oddly charming in its own way, wonky chairs, a small bookshelf holding withered books, and pale-coloured assortments of cushions on the dull carpet.
Sat in a circle on the ground in the middle of this scene were three girls: a blonde, a brunette and a dark-haired girl. They were watching the boys with an equal level of scrutiny and curiosity as they gathered in the small place. One of the girls, the brunette, shrugged before turning her attention to an acoustic guitar in her lap, she strummed lazily at the instrument. The other two girls passed a look between each other.
"Hi." The blonde said, tight-lipped.
"Hi." Multiple of the boys replied.
The dark-haired one coughed in an attempt to cover up a laugh at the awkward tension, "Hello there, you guys are from the boy's academy, right?"
"Yeah," Neil replied, "you know about the Dead Poets Society?" He gestured to the book in her hands: a similar old-looking copy of Leaves of Grass.
"Yeah, we got ours from a previous senior. What about you?"
"A teacher."
"Ah, okay."
"...So, what were you going to do?" Meeks spoke up finally, shook out of whatever stupor he had found himself in.
The blonde spoke, "Well... Alisa made us write poems-"
"I didn't make you do anything, you're a dead poet, aren't you?" The dark-haired one -or Alisa- said with an affronted expression, "It's in the club description."
"You threatened to light our beds on-" the bruenette girl began to speak up.
"Uh sure, dude. That was just your imagination, you're acting crazy," Alisa rolled her eyes dramatically.
"Are we allowed to attend the club? We promise to write poems so you don't have to light our beds on fire..." Neil said cheekily while an easygoing smile spread on his face.
Alisa looked away before replying, "Sure, dudes."
"Hey! I didn't approve of this!" The brunette interrupted.
"Well... do you?" The blonde asked, she pretended like she hadn't been staring at the boy with the glasses, only looking away when he stared back at her.
The brunette gave the boys a once over before nodding with a grin, "Yeah, maybe I do."
"Great!" Neil lowered himself onto a cushion, the other boys followed his lead and found places to sit, "So, are you gonna share what you wrote?"
"Only if you boys share next week," the brunette challenged, "I'm Eliza, by the way." The boys seemed to agree with the deal of the girls sharing this session and them sharing the next session- they went around the room introducing themselves.
"Jessica or Jess," the blonde followed on, "and also do we have to?"
"Alisa," Alisa supplied, "and I mean, come on, might as well. Nothing like telling secrets to strangers."
She rifled through a backpack close to her, pulling out snacks, which she passed to Jess who promptly offered them to the boys, they graciously accepted them, before finally finding what it was she was searching for: a notebook. Only now was Alisa starting to show some degree of apprehensiveness about sharing her work, the brown-skinned girl took in a shaky breath as she flicked to a dogeared page.
Alisa tucked her fringe behind her ear before starting to speak in a tone that started unsure but progressively got more confident-
'The call beckons him closer,
whispering, promising, serenading,
her shimmering scales and soft skin
his boundless lust
a spring rabbit and a stalking huntress,
The call beckons him closer...'
She tore her eyes from the page, her face downturned and hair masking her eyes slightly with embarrassment but the clapping of the gathered Dead Poets a lopsided smile quirked onto her face. She pushed her round-rimmed glasses up the bridge of her nose and gave a theatrical bow- "Thank you, thank you and next, the beautiful Eliza."
Alisa had a comforting smile painting her face as the girl placed down her guitar and took out a folded piece of paper from her jacket pocket, Eliza seemed to be less reserved than the other girls and confidently unfolded her paper and started reading her poem:
'Parents, blind to woes, deaf to cries,
In their castle, where love dies.
Their rules, their way, no compromise,
Our dreams crushed beneath their lies.'
The last line lingered in the air, the gathered crowd pondered about Eliza's life and experiences, acutely interested in the seemingly extremely laid-back girl's story. Charlie started to clap and was followed along with the rest of the people in the dingy hideout, Jess prepared herself for her turn.
She pulled a black notebook out of her backpack and scrambled to find the page with her poem written in, "Okay, so, I'm not actually... that great with poetry. So, yeah. This is what I got-"
'Within shifting tides,
Soul's voyage embraces growth,
Change etched in depths.'
An awkward expression graced her face as she stumbled her way through the poem, after finishing reading, she immediately covered her reddening face with the notebook. Alisa made sure to clap the loudest for her friend's poems and added in a little cheer when Jess actually did hers- she also passed glances to Eliza, raising an eyebrow and subtly nodding to the boy wearing glasses who looked transfixed by their blonde friend.
Neil, evidently somewhat of a leader of the group of boys, gave a smile which showed off his dimples, "This time next week?"
Alisa looked away, seemingly blinded by the boy's bright expression, "Sure."